Transportation chairmen oppose gas tax rollback

BILL HILES for StateGazette.com
September 26, 2005

The chairmen of the state House and Senate transportation committees, both of whom represent Dyer County, each said Friday they oppose a rollback of the state's gasoline tax.

"It's ill-advised because it's sort of a gimmick that wouldn't result in any significant savings to the average citizen and it could damage our road system," said Sen. Mark Norris, R-Collierville, chairman of the state Senate Transportation and Safety Committee. "If you're serious about rolling back taxes, let's roll back the state sales tax."

"I am emphatically against (rolling back the gas tax)," said Rep. Phillip Pinion, D-Union City, chairman of the House Transportation Committee. "The states that are rolling gas taxes back are the ones that charge a sales tax on top of the gas tax."

Several members of the House Republican caucus have suggested that Tennessee cease collecting its 21.4 cents-a-gallon motor fuel tax for 30 days to help consumers cope with near-$3-a-gallon gasoline.

Norris noted that the average Tennessean would realize a savings of about 50 cents a day from a gas tax moratorium, but a 30-day rollback would cost the state transportation department $50 million.

"The Bredesen Administration has taken money from the gas tax to balance the state budget in the last four years that totals about $217 million," he said. "Although the state had a surplus for last fiscal year, gas tax revenues were below budget and they're below budget for the first quarter of this fiscal year."

Pinion said that states that apply sales tax to gasoline sales have enjoyed a steep increase in sales tax collections as gas prices rose.

"We don't collect sales tax on gasoline," he said. "Whether gas is 40 cents or $3 a gallon, we still get the same 21.4 cents a gallon."

He said a 30-day moratorium on gas tax collections would cost the state's general fund a million dollars, the state road fund $30,390,000, cities $6,451,000 in state-shared street funds and the state's 95 counties $12,887,000 in state-shared road funds.

"If we had a 30-day moratorium it would take money out of cities and counties," Pinion said. "And we pay as we go on highway construction projects, but we've pledged money we haven't collected yet, so if we had a moratorium we'd just about have to stop construction projects."

Norris noted that a recent study shows that the state is running an $8 billion infrastructure deficit in transportation and a moratorium would further increase that amount.

"It would be penny wise and pound foolish," he said. "It also could hamper the state coming up with matching funds for increased funding we expect to get from the new federal highway bill."

Norris said counties lost 9 percent of their state funding to help balance the state budget and that money has not yet been restored.

"From a policy-development point of view, a moratorium is just ill-advised," he said. "It wouldn't cause any long-term benefit."

Pinion said he believes the proposal is grandstanding.

"Something like this is just press play," he said. "The people who are proposing this have no idea what it would cost.

"Some of these young radicals who have been elected in the past few years would rather look good than do good," he added. "I'm old-fashioned because I'm up here (Nashville) to manage the state's business for the people."